Yes,this has been the worst perch catching season in memory.Seams like the balance in Erie is out of whack.The perch catching has been terrible all over lake past 3yrs and now the western basin has poor perching also.The past two seasons in the western basin,guys had remarked about the good size perch they were catching and hardly any dinks.Well,those dinks were the next age class we needed to catch this year.There has also been hardly any emerald shiners to use for fishing.The number one preferred bait to catch walleye and for them to eat out in lake.Some guys are blaming commercial netting.But we have had netters for quite some time.Some are blaming all the walleye in the lake eating young perch and chasing perch to prevent them from schooling up.We had large walleye population in the 80s and still had plenty of perch to catch.But we did not have all the invasive species in Erie in the 80s,like we do now.Now the ODNR is telling us that the perch population is fine and the reason nobody can catch perch on rod and reel is due to perch eating the spiny flees in our lake.I can imagine the perch eating whatever is available,but having an unlimited amount of one food source so you are not hungry to eat goldie minnows or other bait is difficult reason to accept.If the perch numbers are in fact healthy,i would expect the commercial guys to catch the same amount perch as in past years.Will be interesting on how this plays out.I do think the emerald shiner population will rebound but not sure if that will affect the perch catching in the future.